"Cigarette?"
Detective Taurez held up a pack. The man on the other side of the table waved them away.
"No thanks. I quit four years ago."
The big Puerto Rican grunted. "Lucky you. I've been trying for years, never got beyond a couple of weeks yet. You mind?"
"Be my guest."
Taurez popped a cigarette into his mouth and lit up. He took a lungful, held it, then expelled it softly, studying the man opposite him carefully. He tapped some ashes into the cheap foil ashtray in the centre of the table and indicated to the tape recorder by the man's right side. "You ready?"
The man shrugged. "Guess so."
Taurez puffed out another lungful of smoke. "Okay then, from the top."
"Name and everything?"
"Yep."
The man considered for a moment. "May I have a glass of water? My throat's kinda dry, and I got a lot to tell."
"Sure. Wyman..." the big cop gestured to a uniformed officer standing by the door. He vanished outside for a moment, then returned with a plastic cup. The man accepted it gratefully.
"Thanks." He took a sip, then cleared his throat, running his hands through his hair, making an effort to compose himself.
He began.
"My name is John Newman. I'm 34 years old. I've been teaching music and drama at the San Marco High School for the last seven years, since moving from England the year before that."
"Is that where you met her? The High School?"
"No, not at the school. I met her last year, about eight or nine months ago. About Easter time, I think. I met her at one of those encounter sessions they run at the University in the evenings."
"Encounter session about..."
"Loss of a spouse, or loved one."
"Ah yes. Your wife was killed." Taurez looked down at a file on the tabletop.
"Murdered, Inspector. She was murdered."
"Yes. Of course. My apologies, Mr Newman. She disturbed a burglar, is that correct?"
"Yes. Janice came home early, and must have found him in the apartment. We put in the best locks and everything on the doors and windows, but it didn't seem to make any difference. Does it?"
"No, Mr Newman. It never seems to these days."
"Well, he shot her. I found the body. I guess that's in your file as well."
"Yes. I'm very sorry."
"Well... anyway. You never caught him, did you?"
"It doesn't look like it, I'm afraid."
"He was probably a drug addict, or something, right?"
"That's usually the case."
"Hmmm... I like to think, sometimes, that maybe what he got for the stuff he stole from us, he bought something that gave him an overdose. Do you think that's wrong of me?"
"No, Mr Newman. I imagine I'd feel the same way if someone killed my wife that way."
"Are you married, Inspector?"
"Only to my job, Mr Newman. Please continue."
"Sorry, don't mean to go off course like that."
"No problem. Please carry on."
"Well, like I said, someone at work put me onto this encounter session being run at the University. I wasn't dealing with Jan's death very well, and it was starting to show at work. So my boss at the High School, Phil Genaro, told me all about this course. To be honest, I thought it was a waste of time, but I went in the end, mainly because I knew I had to do something. And mainly... because the evenings were so lonely without her.
"It was actually helping, y'know? There were quite a few people there with stories like mine. Loss and bereavement. Not always violent, mind you, and not always in the criminal sense. Car wrecks, accidents at work, stuff like that. Quite a variety. It helped me realise that I wasn't the only one. You know? The only one who had suffered like that. Up until then, I thought I was."
"And the woman... the victim. You met her there?"
"That's right. I'd already been going a month or two, the one evening she just showed up. She showed up quite regularly, too. I didn't speak to her immediately, you see. Only after a few weeks. She kept herself to herself, hardly said a word. Marge, the woman who usually ran the meetings, she tried a few times to involve her, but she usually found a way of getting out of it. Passing it on. Well, you didn't have to speak if you didn't want to. That was the point. They kinda tried to ease you in, you know?"
"I see. But you eventually got to talk with her?"
"Yes. It was after a meeting. We ended up in the car lot together, and got talking. It kinda went from there."
"How did you get talking, Mr Newman? What was her loss? Presumably she had one."
"She wouldn't talk about it at first, no. How did we get talking? I don't know. I'd noticed her, of course."
"She was quite good looking, no?"
"That's not the reason, Inspector. If you think-"
"That's what I'm trying to rule out, Mr Newman. Please?"
"Yeah... well, yes, I guess she was... I mean, that's how I noticed her. But it was... well, she was different. Not just the way she looked, but the way she acted. She was... different."
"How so?"
"I... I can't really say. Things she told me later, well... maybe they explained it. If they were true."
"Things?"
"If I told you, you really would think I was mad."
"I hear a lot of so-called mad things, Mr Newman. You'd be surprised how many turn out to be true."
"She told me... she told me she was from a different world. Different planet. Different time, even."
"Ah ha. How did she, ah, qualify this statement? You believed her, obviously."
"She had two hearts."
"Ah ha."
"Didn't you do an autopsy?"
"It's on its way. Slow night, y'know?"
Taurez paused, and lit another cigarette.
"So what did you get talking about?"
"I told her what had happened to me. She was quite sympathetic. In fact, she cried. That's how we ended up at the coffee shop, talking."
"And she told you she was, ah, from another planet?"
"No, that was later. No, she told me that... she'd done something very wrong, in the past. In the quite recent past. She said she was in New York trying to get away from it. Trying to forget what happened."
"She hadn't been here long, then?"
"No. A few weeks, maybe more, maybe less. She didn't go into specifics."
"The name she gave you... Jane Smith. You weren't, ah, kinda suspicious?"
"Inspector, in all my years of teaching, I've had no less than four pupils with that name. It isn't uncommon, y'know."
"Sorry. Naturally suspicious. But it wasn't her real name, was it?"
"No. She never told me that."
"What was it she'd done?"
"She said... because of what she'd done, some people had died. A lot of people."
"How many is a lot?"
"She said... an entire civilisation. A whole planet, gone. Destroyed."
"How?"
"By something she'd done. By a mistake she'd made. All because she hadn't listened to this guy she'd been travelling with."
"Guy?"
"Yeah. She called him the Doctor."
"Doctor who?"
"She never gave me his name. I don't even think she knew it."
"Ah ha. How long had she travelled with him?"
"Quite a while. But apparently they'd split up a few times. They'd known each other a long time."
"How long?"
"A long time."
"Were they, related? In a relationship?"
"Just friends, I think. Or at least they were."
"They split up badly, then?"
"Because of what she'd done, yes. She said she couldn't stay with him any longer. She said she felt so horribly guilty about what she'd done, that she had to leave him. So she came here. Trying to pick up the pieces, I guess."
"Was he after her, then?"
"She was worried he might be looking for her, because she left so suddenly. She said he'd forgiven her, but she couldn't bear the thought of him having to share something that was her fault. She was... well, it seemed to me like she was more afraid of the consequences for him rather than her. Like she didn't want him involved. Inspector, do you think the man who killed her was this Doctor?"
"It's a possibility."
"I don't think it was. He was a lot older, from what she told me. And he wasn't the killing type, by all accounts."
"Ah ha. They never are, Mr Newman."
"Have you done his autopsy, yet, Inspector? The killer, I mean?"
"No, Mr Newman. Do you believe he was alien as well?"
"He bled blue blood, Inspector."
"Yes, he did, didn't he? Tell me more about the woman, please. How long did you stay together?"
"She left me that night, in the coffee shop. She didn't leave her phone number or anything. I didn't see her again for a couple of months."
"She didn't go back to the encounter group?"
"No. I was kinda worried. But then, she turned up again. Right on my doorstep."
"How so?"
"There was a knock on the door one evening, and there she was. She was in bad way. Dishevelled, almost knocked about almost."
"Beaten up?"
"I don't know. Maybe. She was bleeding at the mouth, and I later found out she had broken ribs. All she said was that she'd gotten involved in something she shouldn't have - again! And that she'd almost paid the price for it."
"And you let her in?"
"I had no choice. She collapsed, almost. I virtually dragged her, and put her to bed."
"Ah huh."
"It wasn't like that, Inspector. We were never... you know, intimate, that way. I couldn't. I still can't. Janice... is, and probably still will be, the only one for me."
"I didn't mean to imply anything, Mr Newman. I do apologise. But you did, ah, like her?"
"Of course! She needed help."
"Very gallant of you."
"What would you have done, then? Left her on your doorstep?"
"Take it easy, Mr Newman."
"It's just... I tried, you know? I tried to help her... but I couldn't... I just couldn't, in the end..."
He started to sob. Taurez watched him for a moment, then leaned over and switched off the tape recorder. "We'll take five. Lenny, get some more water, will you?"
***
"Sorry, Inspector."
"No need to be. You've been through a lot."
"Thanks. I'm ready to start again."
"Okay, Mr Newman. Tell me about... the last couple of days. Your own time. No hurry, now."
"Well, we, ah, we were together a few months. She was really too sick to be by herself. I looked after her. She didn't really have no where else to go. She had an apartment somewhere, but she never said where until later. Anyway, I looked after her. It was, ah, purely for companionship, you understand?"
"I do, yes."
"But I grew to care for her a lot. Being so vulnerable. I - we - Janice and I, never had kids. The apartment was empty all day. I felt useful, again, looking after her."
"That was how you found out she had two hearts?"
"Yes. I was - shocked. At first."
"But it didn't put you off, in any way? And you weren't tempted to maybe, tell someone else? Us, for instance? After all, it's not everyday an alien being turns up on your doorstep."
"No. She needed help. My help. What would you have done? Turned her over to the government? Put her in a zoo?"
"I don't honestly know what the procedure would be, Mr Newman. I'm just a homicide detective." Though he knew there were whistles and bells sounding in high office at this moment after this. Not his problem, though. Thank God.
"Sorry, Inspector. I didn't mean to bite your head off."
"Forget about it. We'll just stick to the matter in hand. She stayed with you for, ah, how long?"
"A couple of months. Then she vanished again."
"Just left? Like that, after all you'd done?"
"She left a note."
"Do you have it?"
"Somewhere, in the apartment. Is it important?"
"Maybe. What did it say?"
"She was afraid of getting me mixed up in something. She was afraid... I'd die too. Because of her. That's why she left."
"Did you look for her?"
"I never stopped! Then, one day, she called me. Out of the blue."
"How long ago?"
"A couple of weeks ago."
"And?"
"She was worried. About me, mainly. She was afraid... well, she was afraid someone was after her, and she wanted to... warn me, I guess."
"Do you suppose that this person following her was this Doctor?"
"No, someone else. Someone worse."
"She say who, or what he, she, was? Any hints at all?"
"No. It was just a feeling she had. A strong feeling. But she said she knew something like this might happen. She didn't explain how, or why."
"You met up again?"
"Yes. I tracked her down through the phone company. Apartment on the East side."
"Yes. Where she was..."
"Yes. There."
"You went there for the first time this evening?"
"Yes."
"And you took a gun with you."
"Yes. She sounded in bad trouble. Someone watching her, following her, she said. I had this gun, well, Jan suggested we got one, because of the crime and everything. I hated having it in the house, but Janice was keen on it. Her dad was a cop. You know him?"
"Walt Hardy, yeah, I heard of him. Retired to New Mexico, right?"
"Yes, right. He told her to get a gun. No damn good to her, was it? Anyway, I still had it, in a drawer, and I took it with me."
"How was she, that evening?"
"Nervous. Panicky. She seemed a bit offhand about me turning up, though. Just opened the door and let me in."
"And this guy, the one who she said was following her..."
"She said he was around, somewhere. She said she was being careful, keeping an eye out."
"She let you in."
"Yeah, but, she knew me."
"Ah ha. So... how did you end up outside?"
"She had a cat. Or said she did. She was very worried about it. She said she heard it crying outside, down in the alley..."
"Yes..."
"And she rushed out. I couldn't stop her. The door slammed, the bolt was a funny one, took me ages to open... or felt like ages. By the time I got it open, she was in the lift and going down. I took the stairs."
"Twelve flights. Not good."
"You said it..."
He took his head in his hands, and for a moment Taurez was afraid he'd broken down again. Then...
"She was already outside by the time I got down there. I ran for the alley. I could hear her there, moving around, calling to this cat..."
He swallowed, face pale.
"Then I heard her speaking to someone."
"What did she say?"
"'Oh, it's you', or something like that. No, wait. It was 'Oh, it's you. I thought this might happen'. I came round the corner, and there they were."
"Her, and the guy with the blade?"
"Yes. She was stood still in front of him. She... she, ah..."
He stifled a sob. It took a moment for him to continue. When he did, his face was wet with tears.
"I saw her... I saw her... she bared her neck to him. Offered herself right up. Jesus..."
He wiped at his eyes. He couldn't stop.
"She looked almost... relieved. She closed her eyes, and ah.... Smiled, almost. I just couldn't believe it. I just couldn't believe it. And I couldn't move. Couldn't... react, quick enough.
"When he swung, I just lost it. I ran at him. Firing, wildly. It jammed around the sixth shot I think, I never bothered to keep it clean after Jan... well, I figure I hit him with one or two, 'cause he went down. I got him, I got him... too late, but I got him."
"He wasn't dead, though..."
"No. No, he was in a bad way. Chest, lot of blood. Blue blood, like I said. He was lying there holding himself and crying in this weird language. Never heard it before. He looked up at me. I guess I was pointing the gun at him, 'cause he started begging, telling me how... rich... he could make me... power, money... Jesus, as if that mattered...
"I was working at the slide on the gun. You know, trying to free the jam, or something. It... cleared. And I looked down... at him... and he... looked up at me... and he said... 'I can give you anything you want. Just name it... and it's yours.'
"And... ahh... I saw... her head. Lying there. Looking at me... And... she... it... looked... like Janice."
He was sobbing uncontrollably now, couldn't help himself.
"And... I... I... said to him. 'You can't bring... her... back... can you? Can you?' And I shot him. I shot him... again. Through the head... God..."
Taurez reached across and switched the tape recorder off.
"Interview terminated. 3.23AM."
He sat there for a long time, even after they took him away. He looked at the empty chair opposite, and down at the coroner's report he'd been passed. He shook his head slowly, rubbing at steadily increasing knot of pain in his forehead.
"There are times when I really I hate this job," he muttered.
He lit up another cigarette
***
John Newman awakened from an uneasy sleep with a cry. He'd been dreaming that he was sharing his cell with the Devil.
When he opened his eyes, he wondered if it were true.
A little old man was sitting at the foot of the narrow cell bed. His hands were folded in his lap and he was watching him behind heavy rimmed spectacles with a cat-like intensity.
"Mr Newman?" His voice was cultured and English-accented.
John sat bolt upright on the bed, clutching his knees. "Y-yes? Who are you? How did you get in here?"
"I'm a friend of..." he looked away, blinking suddenly behind his glasses. "I'm a friend," he continued. "We had a mutual acquaintance who is, I'm rather... saddened, to discover, no longer with us." He looked down at something he had in his hands, and John realised it was a photograph. It was crumpled, and dog-eared, and it was splattered with some kind of blue substance. He tucked it away inside his heavy black overcoat. John didn't see the face clearly, but he knew who it was of. The blue substance gave it away.
He looked back at John directly, and suddenly John knew exactly who he was as well.
"You're... him, aren't you? The Doctor..."
"Yes. Yes, I'm rather afraid I am. I'm sorry if my sudden appearance frightened you. It seems I have picked up a distressing habit of doing this sort of thing. When I turn up at all, that is." There was a strong hint of self-loathing in that quiet, civilised voice.
"You... why are you here?" John whispered.
"I was intending to find... our mutual friend. Someone, I discovered, rather too late, wanted to kill her. Regrettably, largely because of me, it seems. I could not allow that to happen, but, it appears, I was rather too late." This time he didn't turn away to hide the expression of pure anguish on his face. "I seem to have slipped into the habit of being too late for things, these days."
"I'm sorry," John whispered.
"No reason you should be," he said with mild surprise. "Not your fault at all."
"But it was. I could have - should have - saved her!"
The old man grasped his arm with surprising strength - and spoke with surprising compassion. "No. No, my friend, that was my responsibility. I have been somewhat lacking in following up my responsibilities of late. A state of affairs that is about to change." His voice rang loud in the cell. The look of anguish on his face had been replaced by one of supreme determination.
"Can I... can I... help you?"
The old man peered at him owlishly. "Would you like to?" he replied, hopefully.
"Yes... yes, anything! She... I...."
The old man grasped his hand firmly. "She was my friend, too. We went back quite a long way, though possibly I never really knew her as much as I ought to. I owed her a great deal, and she deserved better than this. I never should have let her go off like that. Never!
"But I know who is responsible. I know who they are, and where they are... and why they are doing it. She helped me discover this, even at the cost of her own life." He slapped his hands on his legs and stood up. "Time it was properly stopped, I think. What do you say, Mr Newman?"
"I say, let's get the bastards!" John punched the air with a fist.
The old man raised an eyebrow. "Indeed!"
He pushed open the cell door and stepped into the moonlit corridor beyond. He held out a hand.
"Come on, then, Mr Newman. Let's show them a thing or too!"
John Newman stood and grasped the old man's hand, and he followed him into the corridor.
The Doctor's voice lingered in the still air.
"I understand you're a bit of an actor, Mr Newman? I think I might have just the role for you..."
Next: Past Caring
